Los Palacios in Colombia with Luce Moreau

Travel and art residence in Colombia around the artistic project Les Palais by the artist Luce Moreau, accompanied by Constance Meffre, Marine Douet and Dominique Hardouin.

From September 12 to 24 – in Bogotá, Medellín, San Rafael, Maceo, Santa Marta, Barranquilla.

During 12 days in September, the artist Luce Moreau travelled to several cities in Colombia to continue her plastic and theoretical research in the continuation of the international project The Palaces she leads since 2015. To do this, Curator Constance Meffre, the French-Colombian interpreter Marine Douet and the beekeeper Dominique Hardouin accompany her on this trip to meet Native American ‘meliponas’ beekeepers, specialized academics and professionals from the local art scene. So many highlights favoring the observation of techniques, materials and customs melipones for their comparison with the current plastic practice of the artist.

Present in all Latin America, from Mexico to Argentina, the endemic bee Melipona or « stingless bee » intrigues both the beekeeping and scientific community for its rhizomic constructions and the virtues of its honey. The melipone builds real cities whose main pyramidal structure sheltering the individuals is organized in the form of plateaus and terraces, in the center of a whole network of vats like so many reserves of its provisions. The colonies live there harmoniously and the beekeepers are guardians of the good forest management, thus ensuring an ecological balance in a country where the luxuriant forest occupies a large majority of the territory.

This architectural organization offers the Les Palais project a support for research and work with regard to Luce Moreau‘s latest achievements around utopian architecture and community societies (Space, Future, Hemicycle, Mechanical Breccia …); the Latin American part Los Palacios, whose subject of study will be the meliponal bee, is intuitively oriented towards a telescoping of techniques of lost wax sculpture, 3D modeling, archeology and pre-Columbian heritage. The residency and the many meetings scheduled in Colombia will enable the artist to refine these intuitions and work on artistic achievements.

Production in Colombia of Los Palacios

Diffusing Digital Art & Otto-Prod, with the support of the French Institut, la Région PACA, et la Ville de Marseille, the PACA, and City of Marseille.